D.C. Mayor Calls for Warrantless Searches of Ex-Prisoners
THOMAS HEDGES, TRNN: Cities across the country are still reeling from a summer of violence, with homicide rates that increase 70, 80, even 100 percent in some places. City officials and police unions are proposing harsher legislation in an effort to fight what they call the main culprits: drugs, guns, and gangs.
But here in Washington, DC where homicide rates are up more than 50 percent compared to last year, the Democratic mayor Muriel Bowser has introduced one of the most controversial bills in the country. The Public Safety and Criminal Code Act of 2015 would make it legal for law enforcement officials to conduct warrantless searches on some newly released prisoners on parole or probation.
AARON GOGGANS: Muriel Bowser's bill is very scary.
HEDGES: Goggans, a writer and Black Lives Matter DMV activist says Mayor Bowser's bill strengthens control and surveillance, but not safety.
GOGGANS: We think that this is kind of the mayor laying out the groundwork to do a predictive policing model in DC. In 2013, the city got a contract with a group out of Colorado Springs to do predictive policing, and to bring a predictive policing platform to DC. This is as scary as it sounds. Predictive policing is actually their name, but the idea that you try and reach out to offenders before they've actually offended. It's a very Big Brother, 1984 kind of way to do policing. It's very terrifying. But also is a model trying to be followed by a lot of states.
HEDGES: When Mayor Bowser introduced the law back in August, she defended her bill amid the shouts and yelling of protesters.
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